In many days to come, Maj. Hamza
al-Mustapha, former Chief Security Officer to the late Head of State,
Gen. Sani Abacha, will have to learn how to live as a free man.
Al-Mustapha was appointed Chief Security
Officer to the Head of State with a Special Strike Force Unit during
Abacha’s military regime (November 17, 1993 – June 8, 1998).
After about 15 years of incarceration,
based on a series of allegations including extra-judicial killings under
the regime of the late Abacha, his new found life came on the heels of
the judgment of the Court of Appeal, Lagos, which on Friday discharged
and acquitted him of the murder of the late Kudirat Abiola.
Al-Mustapha’s travails, as confirmed by
him while testifying during his trial before the Lagos High Court,
started soon after his former boss died on June 8, 1998.
The former CSO to the Head of State was
schemed out of the military politics, which eventually threw up Gen.
Abudusalami Abubakar as the new Head of State.
Some months after the new government
became comfortable on its seat in 1998, al-Mustapha was posted out of
the Presidential Villa to Enugu, where he was first accused of being in
possession of Abacha’s property.
Before he was subsequently arraigned for
the murder of Kudirat in 1999, he faced a number of panels over series
of allegations, one of which was the importation of ammunition from
Libya to remove Abubakar as the Head of State.
He also faced the Special Investigation
Panel set up by former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s administration,
which succeeded Abubakar’s.
The investigation of the SIP was what
culminated in his arraignment alongside Shofolahan, son of the late Head
of State, Mohammed Abacha; Rabo Lawal, a Chief Superintendent of
Police, who was the head of the Mobile Police Force Unit in the
Presidential Villa.
After the case was moved away from the
Magistrate’s Court, the four men were arraigned before Justice Augustine
Adetula Alabi on two counts of murder and conspiracy.
Later,the case was then transferred to
another judge following al-Mustapha’s application that it should be
transferred from Justice Ade-Alabi.
They were re-arraigned before Justice Dada in 2008.
As the matter dragged on, in a judgment
similar to the judgment of the Court of Appeal delivered on Friday, the
Supreme Court on July 11, 2002, discharged and acquitted Mohammed Abacha
on the basis that no evidence linked him with the alleged crime.
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Abdusallam Abubakar, OBJ and all that wished this man dead should bury their heads in shame.
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